Note: Thank you to NetGalley, Lyons Press, Dave Brown, and Jeff Rodimer for the advanced reader copy of the book. This review will also be posted on NetGalley. What follows is my unbiased review of the book.

Baseball can be a strange game. Weird things tend to happen, and then there are the personalities. I was a fan during the days of Mark Fidrych who used to talk to the baseball, and Fernando Valenzuela who used to look heavenward rather than where he was going to pitch the ball.

Shadows of Glory is the story of 18 World Series where unusual things happened. It spans more than a century of the game, so there are many changes along the way. Some of the stories I’d heard or witnessed first-hand. Others were more obscure.

The authors provide incredible context to the stories. Some of them go back decades to establish the setting for events that occur in a particular World Series. This is the case as the authors recount the Cubs finally breaking the “curse” and winning the series in 2016.

One of the stories is of how the Spanish Flu and World War I affected the 1918 Series. It was much different than our experience in 2020 and 2021 with the coronavirus. There was the pitcher who left the stadium mid-game to drive his pregnant wife to the hospital, and no one knew where he went. The call went out by radio and on television, but he stayed with her for the birth of his son. Fortunately, it didn’t come down to needing him to pitch, but the game did go into extra innings.

I knew of one notable shoe polish incident in the Mets’ 1969 World Series against the Baltimore Orioles. There was another, and for how it tied to the 1969 one, you’ll have to read.

Not all of the stories are quirky. I never knew that Babe Ruth held the record for the most shutout innings pitched in a World Series until Whitey Ford came along and broke it.

The authors don’t cover the more well-known World Series stories, such as the ball going through Bill Buckner’s legs in 1986 to give the Mets a Game 6 victory when the Red Sox were one out away from winning the series, or Bill Mazeroski’s Series-ending home run in 1960. They are brought up throughout the book, though, to compare to others.

Former player Mark Teixeira wrote the foreword, and he talks about the incident he was a part of where Cliff Lee had to hop on a subway amidst throngs of Yankee fans after he missed the team bus and got stuck in traffic, then went on to have a stellar game, striking out 10 with no walks and no earned runs.

The stories are great and the detail is here. I thought it could have been edited a bit more as the authors give readers just about every detail imaginable that pertains to these incidents, but they are a lot of fun to read regardless.

Shadows of Glory is a great read for baseball fans, especially those who appreciate the history of the game and some of the strange things that occur in the course of a World Series. I learned a few things along the way as well, and in watching Ken Burns’ Baseball as a prelude to this baseball season (something I do every spring), I recognized a number of the games from this book.